This analysis of the HBO television series ‘Carnivàle’ focuses on its overarching style as well as on its abrupt ending after two seasons.

The beatification of Saint Teresa of Ávila in October 1614 gave rise to widespread celebrations in many of the cities and towns of the Iberian Peninsula. Printed relaciones describing these celebrations, despite their limitations —in terms of political agenda, propaganda, rivalry and literary style— can nevertheless provide information about musi…[Read more]

‘Passio Iudeorum Pragensium’, a late fourteenth–century pogrom narrative from Bohemia, provides many unique insights into the medieval tradition of pogrom narratives. It is preserved in the form of a number of related but distinct textual units that allow us to examine the discursive nature of texts such as these. This discursiveness is illus…[Read more]

Manuscript Munich, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, Clm 6298 contains an as yet unexamined fragment of the second batch of the gospel glosses (EvII) from the biblical commentaries of the Canterbury School inserted as an addition in 3r of the manuscript. In this article, I describe this fragment, and I attempt to contextualize its insertion into the…[Read more]

‘If God Meant to Interfere’: Evolution and Theodicy in Blood Meridian

There are two kinds of academic writing, if we classify the work by the nature of the author’s expertise. The first one, the most prevalent, is the kind of writing that is born out of the scholarly work of the author and is primarily based on research and teaching experience. The second kind, comparatively harder to come by, is the writing of a s…[Read more]

And interview between Julian Darius and A. David Lewis in LAZARUS, THE FOREVER MAN #0 (Martian Lit).

This study reveals that in medieval Dutch vernacular texts (from the Brabantine authors Jan van Boendale, Lodewijk van Velthem, and Jan van Leeuwen, and in the anonymous Boek van Sidrac) the treatment of individual and universal eschatological topics and themes, such as death, heaven, hell, purgatory, the Antichrist, eschatological people, and…[Read more]

This document provides a set of study or discussion questions for each chapter and appendix in my book, “Our God Loves Justice: An Introduction to Helmut Gollwitzer” (Fortress 2017). It is provided to facilitate classroom adoption and use in diverse study groups.

הדרת נשים מהמרחב הציבורי הדתי היא תופעה נרחבת ומוכרת. מתחילת שנות האלפיים אלפי נשים יהודיות, חילוניות, מסורתיות, דתיות וחרדיות, מרקעים סוציו־אקונומיים מגוונים, מתמודדות עם הדרה זו. הן יוצרות ומחדשות ריטואלים דתיים, וכך מפלסות מקום במרחב שהיה סגור בפניהן. השאלה הניצבת בבסיסו של מאמר זה היא מה הן האסטרטגיות שנשים משתמשות בהן כדי ליצור לעצמן ולחדש…[Read more]

This paper examines how ultra-orthodox women perceive the socio-economic reality of contemporary ultra- orthodox society in Israel. In practice most ultra-orthodox women work, and they play an important role in the financial support of their family. The ultra-orthodox press, a major socialization mechanism, has a dualistic approach to this…[Read more]

החברה החרדית בישראל היא חברה מסורתית המנסה לשמור על גבולותיה ולהתנהל כתרבות מובלעת בקרב החברה הישראלית-חילונית. אחד האתגרים ש ִאתם עליה להתמודד הוא חדירתן של טכנולוגיות תקשורת חדשות. האינטרנט הוא מן הטכנולוגיות השנויות ביותר במחלוקת במגזר החרדי, והוא מציב בפניו אתגרים ייחודיים. בשל תכונותיו של המדיום החדש קיים חשש כבד מחשיפת הציבור…[Read more]

New ritual practices performed by Jewish women can serve as test cases for an examination of the phenomenon of the creation of religious rituals by women. These food-related rituals, which have been termed ‘‘amen meals’’ were developed in Israel beginning in the year 2000 and subsequently spread to Jewish women in Europe and the United States.…[Read more]

This study explores how women in two devout religious communities cope with the Internet and its apparent incompatibility with their communities’ values and practices. Questionnaires containing both closed and open-ended questions were completed by 82 participants, approximately half from each community. While their discourses included similar f…[Read more]

Review of “Christian Dogmatics: Reformed Theology for the Church Catholic,” Michael Allen and Scott Swain, eds.

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An MA thesis discussing the role of vegetal offerings in Roman religion, and the shift in attitudes towards them in the first centuries CE

In 1587 the Flemish composer Carolus Luython, employed by Holy Roman Emperor Rudolf II, published an unusual motet collection in Prague. Titled Popularis anni jubilus, the collection describes the sounds and rituals beloved by Central European peasants, recasting them as the ecstatic songs of rustic laborers (jubilus) famously celebrated by Saint…[Read more]

Abstract: In Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe, springs are a central motif of the Prologue
and the novel as a whole. This motif counters male domination, since it
is associated with Chloe, while the flowers watered by springs in this novel
are identified with Daphnis. This study will examine how the motif of springs reflects
the resistance of D…[Read more]

Lev 9:1–10:3 contains two of the most memorable events in the priestly narrative: a public theophany at the tabernacle, and the deaths of Nadav and Avihu. It also contains a long sequence of sacrifices, the importance of which has often been overlooked. This article argues that the ritual acts described in Lev 9 follow established and i…[Read more]